Two days after taking a job for Tesla, owner of The Giving Pies got a simple text message canceling the order
A catering contract to celebrate Black Heritage Month turned into a tough lesson for a Black-owned bakery in the South Bay earlier this month.
What started as a $16,000 deal ended up costing the small business owner thousands of dollars instead.
On Valentine’s Day, the owner of The Giving Pies in San Jose’s Willow Glen neighborhood received a pretty sweet call from a representative with Tesla: a catering job for thousands of mini-pies for a Black History Month event.
Owner Voahangy Rasetarinera, who started the business out of her home in 2017, says both sides agreed on a quote and exchanged an invoice for 4,000 pies for delivery this week. Because of the tight turnaround, Rasetarinera asked staff to work extra hours, she bought ingredients and packaging supplies and declined at least three other catering jobs.
I don’t think this is legal, since it’s a custom order. This is not like a consumer ordering an off the shelf product, it’s more like a verbal contract IMO, but IANAL.
depends on the cancelation clause, usually there would be a time frame before the event they could cancel. There should also be a deposit-especially for events this large…non refundable would have been ideal especially if you need to get materials & OT for staff.
big companies don’t care, they are rich enough that they don’t have to abide by contracts with little people.
So if Tesla is stupid enough to order again, she can say Okeydokey I’ll be right on it, and when the delivery is due, she can just say Sorree I’m not gonna deliver anything anyway, have a nice day?
That’s not a viable business environment, and surely there must be regulation to prevent businesses fucking each other off like that.
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From a company like Tesla it shouldn’t be necessary. I can’t imagine why they prefer to have their reputation tarnished for this?
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It shouldn’t be necessary but the lesson here is always get at least half upfront and if the multi-billion dollar corporation protests ask them why they want free stuff. Custom orders should always need at least half payment up front.